News behind the news. This picture is me (white spot) standing on the bridge connecting European and North American tectonic plates. It is located in the Reykjanes area of Iceland. By-the-way, this is a color picture.

The presidential requirement of being a “natural born citizen” in Article 2, Section 1 of the US Constitution is unique, in that the concept has pretty much no other application in American life. However, it’s not so unique as to be completely without analogy or comprehension. A natural-born citizen can be defined as an American that does not require extra intervention to access citizenship rights. If Cruz had to go through the naturalization process to vote, for instance, or to get a US passport, then he would not qualify to run for President. Instead, Cruz has been able to legally exercise his rights as a citizen without any other intervention except his coming of age, as all American citizens do. Current law makes it clear that regardless of how Canada sees Cruz, the US saw him as a citizen by provenance of his birth — a natural-born citizen.

Senator Cruz’s birth certificate is actually not related to this controversy. Ed Morrissey wonders if Senator Cruz is being a little tongue-in-cheek here. Since the controversy is rather silly to begin with, he might as well have a good laugh about it.

Yesterday Breitbart.com posted an article discussing whether or not Ted Cruz would be eligible to run for President in 2016. The article describes Ted Cruz as “one of the most brilliant constitutional lawyers ever to serve in the Senate.” The question arises because Ted Cruz was actually born in Canada.

The article reports:

Cruz was born in Canada, but his mother was a lifelong American, born in Delaware. (His father was a political refugee from Cuba.) So under federal law, Cruz was born an American citizen by virtue of his mother. His family moved back to Texas, where Cruz grew up, and lived his entire life except the years he spent in New Jersey attending Princeton, Massachusetts attending Harvard Law School, and Washington, D.C., clerking for Chief Justice William Rehnquist at the Supreme Court and later serving in the Bush administration. So this former Texas solicitor general was born an American citizen and has spent almost all his life in America—usually serving his state or nation.

It would be better to report, “Some constitutional experts say he would be ineligible,” or more accurate still, “A small minority of constitutional experts say he would be ineligible.” But no one can make the unqualified claim that the Constitution declares Ted Cruz is unable to run for president.

The entire discussion is a typical pre-emptive strike by the Democrat Party and the media on someone who might eventually be a Republican candidate for President. The old guard of the Republican Party has stood by as the media and Democrats have destroyed some of their most qualified people. It’s time for them to wake up and fight back. There are many smart, gifted, and capable Americans who will never run for office because of the way the media treats conservative candidates. It’s time for a change on the part of reporters and on the part of the Republican Party.